"Thompson, Jim - Cropper's Cabin" - читать интересную книгу автора (Thompson Jim)

"We don't want no gifts," said Pa. "All we want is what we're entitled to."
"Well, I'm afraid . . ." Matthew hesitated. "What did you pay for your ten, Mr. Carver? Fifty--fifty-five an acre?"
"Fifty. But . . ."
"I know. You've put in a great many improvements, done wonders with it. So suppose I do this, since you're dissatisfied and need ready cash. You can go on cropping shares with me, as much or as little land as you like, and I'll take the ten off your hands. I'll give you a hundred and a quarter--no, I'll make that a hundred and fifty an acre."
"A hundred and fifty!" Pa yelled it out.
"Yes. That seems fair, don't you think so, Tom?"
It was much more than fair. But even if I'd been of a mind to say so, I didn't get the chance.
"Fair!" Pa yelled. "I just got through tellin' you I was offered twenty-five hundred a acre!"
"But that was for the mineral rights." Matthew spoke carefully, like he was talking to a child. "It's not worth that as farm land."
"'Course it ain't! Why else'd I be wantin' to lease it for oil?"
"But . . ." Matthew laughed shortly, irritably. A lot less irritably, I reckon, then he felt. Reaching behind him he grasped the reins of his horse. "Don't you think, Mr. Carver," he said, "you're being just a little unreasonable?"
"What's unreasonable about wantin' twenty-five thousand dollars? I got a right to it, ain't I? It's my land, ain't it?"
"And the five thousand adjoining acres are mine. Surely, you can't expect me to . . ."
"Naw, I don't expect you to! Don't expect you to do nothin' that's decent an' makes sense! You don't need money. You got yours, an' you don't care if anybody else has nothin' or not!"
"Now, Mr. Carver . . ."
"To heck with you!"
"Please. You've come here to get this matter straightened out. Now, let's get it straight . . ."
I was getting pretty puzzled; puzzled along with the uneasiness. Because Matthew Ontime didn't have to take lip from anyone, let alone a sharecropper, and he'd never been known to do it. Until now. I almost shook my head, wondering, watching the straight, proud way he stood, watching the flash of his black eyes, the white even teeth. And the reason came to me--the only reason he could have for doing it. And I felt awfully happy, but also sad. And scared.
I remember how Donna had been the day I'd stopped to fix her tire. Cool and pleasant one second, a devil out of hell the next.
". . . the only thing that's real, Mr. Carver. You know how much just a little land can mean to a man. Growing land. Land held in fee simple. You can take care of it, and it takes care of you. Now, it's true that I have far more than the average share, but--well, that's the point, in a way, don't you see? Why should I sacrifice a way of life, and the principles I live by, to get more? Now . . ."
"Yeah, but _I_ ain't . . ."
"Let me finish, please. Let's examine every side of this question. It takes years before land that's been drilled for oil can be brought back to farm land. Sometimes it can never be brought back. It's worthless, eroded and gullied, soaked with oil and salt water. And what happens to the people who farm that land? What would happen to the sixty families who work this plantation?"
Pa grunted. "What do I care what happens to 'em? A bunch o' white trash an' niggers and half-breeds!"
"I see," said Matthew Ontime, slowly. "Is that your attitude also, Tom?"
"You're talkin' to _me_," snapped Pa.
"I'm speaking to Tom. What about it, Tom?"
I waited. Pa jerked his head. "Go ahead, boy. Answer him."
"Yes, sir," I said. I forced the words out. "That's my attitude."
"I'm sorry. But perhaps it's just as well. Now, you'll have to excuse me."
He started to turn toward his horse. Pa leaped forward and caught him by the arm. "I ain't through talkin' to you, you . . . !"
I couldn't see what happened, it was so fast. But Pa suddenly rose up in the air, and when he came down again he was a good two yards from where he'd been standing. He landed on his feet, upright, but it took all of the breath out of him.
"It would seem," said Matthew Ontime, quietly, "that I'm not through talking to you either. You're not cropping for me any longer, Carver. I'm dividing your forty among my other tenants."
"B-but what'll I . . ."
"I don't give a damn, Carver. But if I find you on my land after tonight, you'll be treated as a common trespasser."
He nodded curtly and put a hand on the saddle pommel. And Pa was screaming, "You dirty half-breed! You . . . !" And Matthew was on the horse, and the horse was wheeling, rearing, its hooves raised high in the air. And Pa stumbled backwards and fell, rolled screaming but no longer cursing. And the hooves came down, barely missing him, and raised high again.
I came to my senses and sprang.
I took a running spring, arms spread. And Matthew Ontime came out of the saddle with me on top of him. I clubbed my fist and hit him once, twice. Then I staggered up, back, looking down at him, at _her_, watching him as he sat up, brushing blood from his face.
"_What you bawlin'for? What's the matter, you idjit?_"
Pa was shaking me by the arm. Pulling me toward the road. "Come on, dang you! We hang around here an' . . ."
The barnyard floodlights were coming on, and doors were slamming, and heavy feet were pounding toward us.
We ran.

5
It rained during the night and it was still misty in the morning. But Pa was off for town the minute he'd gulped his breakfast. He knew that Matthew Ontime would have too much pride to put the law on us for what had happened, so he couldn't get into town fast enough. He could go around crowing about how we'd beaten up one of the richest men in Oklahoma, and he'd be perfectly safe.
I set off for school earlier than I usually did, almost looking forward to the trouble I'd find there. You know--or maybe you don't. Maybe you don't know how it is when you're so sick inside, sick and hopeless-feeling, that you want someone to cross you a little; just enough so's you'll have an excuse to make them feel bad, too.
Ordinarily, at least in the winter when the land was fallowing, I cut across fields to the county road. But this morning I had to go around by the plantation road, the one Donna'd brought me home on. There wasn't any doubt in my mind that Matthew Ontime'd meant just what he said about trespassing. As far as that plantation went, he was the law; in fact, both of his overseers had deputy sheriff commissions. They wouldn't haul you into court unless they caught you stealing or some such thing. But they were apt to make you wish that they _would_ take you to court.
I walked along in the mist, my sweater dampening.
Down near the intersection of the county, Nate Laverty whistled at me; and he and his brother Pete came running down the path from their shack. They were big, thin, bucktoothed kids, about my age but several grades behind me. Pete asked me why'n hell I was all bundled up in a sweater. I didn't see him and Nate wearing sweaters, did I? What kind of a sissy was I? he laughed.
"You haven't got a sweater," I said. "You haven't got anything but those ragged-assed overalls and your mealbag shirts."
Nate's face fell. Pete tried to spit, easy like, like he hadn't heard me; and his teeth got in the way, spilling it over his chin.